


Kill Karen Page - Part 4 - Plan of Attack

by KastleInTheSky



Series: Kill Karen Page [4]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, Post-Season/Series 02, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-28 23:43:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7661782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KastleInTheSky/pseuds/KastleInTheSky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karen and Frank struggle with the dynamics of their relationship. Karen, Frank, and Matt come to an agreement on how to pursue Bullseye. Bullseye makes a move on someone very close to Karen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kill Karen Page - Part 4 - Plan of Attack

**Author's Note:**

> This one came out pretty quick. We're getting to the good stuff!  
> Thanks for the read once again! Part 5 coming soon!  
> -KITS

Karen stared wildly at the bulls-eye symbol on the wall of her bedroom. Her eyes darted across the room trying to put all the pieces of this together. All the while, Frank was clutching her hands and desperately trying to haul her back out.  
“Karen!”, he yelled. “Karen, WE HAVE TO GO!”  
Karen numbly began to back away with him and into the living room once again. She was still holding onto her clothes, hurrying herself into the bathroom to dress. She so badly wished that she could feel fear and urgency in this moment, but she didn’t. She felt nothing. There was so much she didn’t understand. Who was in here apartment? How could they have gotten in? None of her windows seemed tampered with. Who drew that bulls-eye? Are they still here?

Karen put on her black cotton yoga pants and a loose fitting olive v-neck t-shirt, picked her purse up off the bathroom floor, and hurried back outside, slipping on a pair of worn out moccasins by her front door. Frank ran to meet her, her travel bag in tow, and the two raced outside and down the steps. As they exited the building, Frank thrust the bag and the car keys over to Karen.  
“Get inside and lock the door. I’ll be right back,” Frank called. He dipped into the shadows of the narrow alleyways next to Karen’s building.  
“No, Frank!”, Karen cried. She was jogging after him into the alley. “Frank, get back here!”  
“GET IN THE CAR,” he yelled. Karen stopped, doing neither what she nor Frank wanted her to do. She stayed and waited for him at the foot of the alley. He had turned some corners towards the back end of the building and fell out of sight for a few moments. She could hear the clanging of him knocking down trashcans and Frank swearing under his breath, snippets of thoughts, like “you motherfucker” and various threats. Eventually he came running back out, his eyes filled with howling rage when he saw Karen still standing there. He passed her, grabbing her by the shoulder and hurrying her towards the car, snatching the keys back. In a flash, the two jumped in and ripped away from the sidewalk, screeching the tires and racing away into the oncoming night.  
“Why didn’t you listen to me?” Frank asked after a small stage of silence. “I told you to get in the car.”  
“And what Frank?” Karen turned to him, waving her hands up and yelling. “Leave you to run in there and into some bad guy by yourself?”  
“He could have still been there, Karen! He could’ve been packin’, and you could’ve been in a lot of danger!”  
“Y’know what, Frank?”, Karen challenged, an ironic chuckle escaping from her lips. “I’m really starting to believe that you don’t think I can take care of myself.”  
“Oh, take care of yourself, huh? Like you were gonna go knockin’ down that alley looking for that son of a bitch who did that to your apartment? You don’t know what that guy’s capable of, alright? You have no idea! You are not safe, Karen. You CANNOT risk doin’ stupid shit.” They had reached Frank’s apartment, safely parked now in the private back lot. Karen again found her gaze set at the window, and this time it was she who was heatedly biting at her lower lip to prevent herself from exploding. 

Still, she whispered to him. “You know that’s not fair, Frank.”  
“What’s not fair, huh? Keepin’ you alive? That not fair to you?”, he pushed.  
“No Frank!” Karen whipped around at him, slapping one hand down hard on the center consol and pointed the index finger of the other hand square at his face. “What isn’t fair, is that I know I’m in danger, I know I’m exposed. I think that’s been made very, very clear plenty of times, Frank. What’s not fair is that YOU, don’t trust me to take care of myself, AT ALL. I’m not sure how you don’t recall this, but I have been through PLENTY. Hell, I’ve been fucking chased down and shot at by YOU before, Frank! And here I am! I am not an imbecile! Now, I know I’m in over my head and I can’t take on whatever Fisk has coming for me by myself, believe me. But I cannot continue to go on like this if you’re going hold my hand and drag me all the way through it. You have to let me help you and be in this fight too! These are the consequences for MY actions, and I can’t allow myself to lay down like a… delicate little flower while you get to run around like I’m begging you to be my fucking savior!”

Karen ended her homily huffing as if she’d just finished the New York City marathon. She slowly lowered her finger from Frank’s face as he sat there staring out into the darkness. He sucked his teeth at her, and opened the car door.  
“Why don’t you do us both a favor, and call Red. Call Murdock, huh? Tell him to get his ass over here. We all need to have a talk.” Frank stood in the alley as Karen stayed in her seat completely dejected. She picked out her phone from her purse and threw it over on the driver’s seat.  
“Call him yourself,” she demanded. She opened her door and stood up, grabbing her bags tight, and headed for the apartment. Frank looked down on her phone and scooped it off the seat. He kept it held high in his hands and Karen continued passed him and into the building, scattering debris, dust, and dirt through the air as she ran by.  
* * *  
About two hours had passed since they’d arrived back, and both Karen and Frank sat in the apartment spitefully ignoring each other. Karen was on the mattress reading a copy of The Bulletin that Frank had left on the counter this morning. Ellison had done a great job of picking up the pieces of her half-finished article, as she expected. Frank was sitting tinkering with his guns on the floor, a large industrial-looking radio next to him playing what sounded like blips of police radio activity. Karen was alternating between reading the articles, and peering up over the paper to see is Frank was looking back at her. She watched his broad shoulders tense and relax and he reaching for parts, his biceps flexing and he rubbed the guns clean. She would catch herself doing this and dart her eyes back to the paper. No, Karen, she thought. Don’t forget he’s an asshole.

Karen leapt off of the mattress and marched into the kitchen in an attempt to put on a pot of coffee with the geriatric drip machine Frank kept in the corner of the counter. She stomped her feet, flung open and closed the cabinets looking for mugs, and clanged the two she did find together noisily. This was half an attempt to disrupt Frank from his methodical dabbling with the guns, half an attempt to actually get him to acknowledge her at all. She found the coffee grinds conveniently on the shelf above the mugs in an otherwise barren cupboard, and took her time heaping the spoonfuls one by one for a full pot.

As she filled the pot with water, she was startled by a knock that seemed to come from the window over by the mattress. Karen paused in place. That can't be right, she thought. Yet again, however, there was a sharp rapping that certainly came from the window. Karen whirled over to look at Frank, who hadn't moved an inch from his position. A thirds set of knocks errupted. Karen was growing exceedingly anxious, still frozen with the coffee pot filled with water hanging above the machine. Eventually, Frank rose, heaving himself up with both hands.  
"I'm comin', I'm comin'," he rasped.  
"Frank," Karen whispered to him from her spot. "Frank, what is that?!"  
Frank shot her a jaded look and responded, "Relax." He crept over to the window, unlocked it and lifted it open strenuously. To Karen's bewilderment, from the open window out on the fire escape, in crawled Matt, donning his entire Daredevil suit.  
"You really called him?!" Karen wailed to Frank. Frank ignored her, instead keeping himself focused on Matt.  
“Door was right there,” Frank sneered at Matt, stepping aside so that Matt could plant his feet firmly inside.  
“Can’t remember the last time someone was willing to let a masked vigilante through the front door. What would I tell them, I forgot my key?”, Matt responded dryly. Matt turned his attention toward Karen, hustling over to her in the corner.  
“Karen,” he said sharply. “How are you holding up?” He came within a foot of her, holding his hands out as if he was about to rest them on her shoulders or give her a hug. The look on Karen’s face must have stopped him. It was still relatively hard for her to process that Matt Murdock of all the people she knew was Daredevil. She couldn’t help but stare at him as if it was a flying pig or the Easter Bunny coming at her.  
Karen cleared her throat. “Matt,” she started. “I’m fine, thank you.” She was holding the coffee pot still in front of her chest.  
“Good… that’s really good,” Matt said awkwardly and he backed away, darting his attention from Karen to Frank, back and forth.  
“So, uh, Frank,” he continued. “What did you need to speak to us for?”

Frank was still standing by the window, watching this exchange with a twinge of laughter on his lips, but with a dead, forceful stare. He closed the window loudly and paced towards the kitchen.  
“You’re here…” he started. “Because Fisk sent the best scumbag marksman he could get to come after her, and we’re gonna need some kind game plan going forward if we’re gonna keep Karen outta danger.”  
“Marksman…” Matt questioned. “What do you mean, marksman?”  
“Calls himself Bulls-eye,” said Frank. Karen let out a long sigh, finally resting the coffee pot down on the table. Now it made sense. As she did that, both Frank and Matt immediately turned their heads to shoot attentive looks at her. She looked at the two embarrassed, and out of necessity spoke.  
“So he was the guy? The, uh… the guy in my apartment?”  
“In her apartment?!” Matt said angrily to Frank. “You didn’t say anything about anyone being in her apartment!”  
“Well I’m tellin’ ya now.” Frank moved towards the small table and took a seat, putting his feet up on the table and leaning back. He continued, “As I was saying, guy calls himself Bulls-eye, best goddam shot I’ve ever seen on anybody. He got locked up a couple months ago finally after the cops busted him as a part of a cocaine smuggling ring, but I had the pleasure of meetin’ him before that. That’s his, his little trademark bullshit that he left on the wall, that’s how I know it’s him. This guy is absolutely lethal, I’ll tell ya. And he’s… he’s hard to pin down, too.”  
“What do you mean, hard to pin down?” Karen asked.  
“I mean…” Frank lowered his head and swallowed, seemingly ashamed.  
“You mean…?” Matt rebutted.  
“I… I mean I couldn’t get a hit on him,” Frank spat out. “I... I couldn’t shoot him. I went over to the water to bust a bunch of those Colombians, and he was there, and I shot at him maybe, 30, 40 times. Missed every single one…”  
Karen groaned deflated and turned to throw her head down on the countertop. Until now, she thought Frank was the most deadly man Hell’s Kitchen ever saw. She rubbed her hands over her eyes and temples. Great, she thought. What does this mean? Again, from behind her, she could feel the eyes of Frank and Matt on her.  
“That’s why I called him here, Karen,” Frank said. “We’re… I…. we need his help.”  
“Very sweet of you, Frank,” Matt answered. “Do we know where this guy works out of? Accomplices, people who know where he’s been, who he deals with, connections, anything?”

“Mostly a loner, does odd jobs for whoever gives him the most cash. Seeing as right now, that’s Wilson Fisk, guy could be goddam anywhere in this city.”  
“Is there a way we can lure him out?” asked Matt. “Anything we can do to make him come to us?”  
Karen rubbed at her head again, her eyes open and blinking furiously. She was mulling over an idea in her head.  
“Aside from dangling her out there like a piece of meat for him, I’d say no,” Frank contended.  
“What if we did?” Karen chimed in. She straightened her back turning her head toward them.  
“Absolutely not, Karen!”, Matt barked. “Are you crazy?”  
“No, I am not crazy, Matt,” Karen scoffed. “You heard what Frank said. The guy is completely off the radar. The only thing we can do besides waiting for him to come find me like sitting ducks is to make him come find me, and be ready to take him out when he comes. I understand… I get that it’s inevitable, okay? This guy is good, and he will come. So, we might as well find a way to get the upper hand.”  
Matt and Frank exchanged looks.  
“She can take care of herself, Red,” Frank said smirking. “It ain’t a bad idea.”  
“So you’re okay with parading her around like a moving target for this guy…”, Matt yelled.  
“If Karen’s okay with it…”

Karen couldn’t help but smile back at Frank. “I’m okay with it,” she started. “As long as the two of you have my six, I think it’s the only shot we’ve got at getting this guy.”  
Karen looked towards Matt, whose mouth was twisted with displeasure. She turned to Frank, who was looking toward Matt challengingly.  
“What do ya say, Red?”, he asked. “You in?”  
“Guess I’m gonna have to be,” he forced. “And how exactly is this going to happen?”  
“Get her outside,” Frank explained. “Get her back on the grid, back in her routine, places he probably knows she’ll go. Won’t try anything while she’s out in public, but if he catches her, he’ll follow her ‘til she’s alone, and that’s when we’ll get him.” He looked at Karen. “Sound good?”  
“Sounds like a plan,” Karen responded. She tried to look relaxed, but inside she was practically shaking from the intense feelings of fear and responsibility, and of pride and readiness. She knew that as badly as Fisk wanted her dead, she wanted to beat him at his own game.  
“Fine,” Matt gave in. He walked himself back over to the window from which he entered. “Whatever it takes, I guess.” He turned himself one last time to Karen.  
“Will you be okay here until then? Do you need anything? If you need anything at all, another place to stay, you know where to find me. You know that.”  
“I’m okay here, Matt,” she answered. “Frank and I are fine here. I’ll call you in the morning before I leave for work, if you’d like to follow around.”  
Matt nodded and heaved the window opened and began to slide out. He took a final look at Frank.  
“You better take care of her,” he warned. Frank mumbled something inaudible to Matt under his breath and Matt snuck out the window and back into the night, but Karen heard it and blushed.

She walked over to the window to close it, looking out on the city as she did. The street below her was starting to empty out, a few stray cars parked here or there, but it was becoming desolate. She was tired. As she turned back towards Frank, he was again gaping at her fiercely. Karen smiled softly to break that tension.  
“So I can take care of myself, huh?”, she challenged. Frank bolted up off his chair and over to her.  
“You think this is cute, huh? You just agreed to dangle yourself out there for some psycho to come find you and you think it’s cute?”  
"I don't think it's cute, Frank!", Karen argued. "You just said it yourself! We don't have any other choices!"  
"Of course we do! That's keep you out of danger and let me handle this!"  
Frank was stomping his way in a bee line over to Karen. He was within inches of her, and Karen could feel his hot, hurried breaths enter her mouth and her nostrils.She challenged him, not backing away for space, but rather standing her ground and glowering back him.She took a deep breath in, stood herself up straight, steadied her feet.  
"What are you so afraid of, huh Frank?"  
"You think I'm afraid?", Frank contested.  
"I know you're afraid! I want to know what you're afraid of!" Karen crossed her arms and looked on him, stone-face. Frank bit his lip again, slowly backed away, and turned towards the table with his hands on his hips. He rested at the table without saying anything.  
"I know this could be a long shot, Frank," Karen called softly to him. "But I can do this, Frank. WE can do this, I know it." She approached Frank cautiously.  
"Do you trust me?", Frank asked, still turned away from her. Karen halted, slightly taken back by his question.  
"Yeah..." she muttered. "Yeah, Frank... I trust you... Do you trust me?"  
He planted his hands on the kitchen table. Still face away from her, Karen saw Frank nod his head slowly.  
"Yeah...", he rasped.  
"Then we can do this, Frank. We can do this together."  
Frank nodded again. "Alright," he said. "Alright, alright. We'll do it." He turned his head to her and smirked. "I got your six."  
Karen giggled relieved. "Shut up," she laughed.  
"Told you should be a Marine," he joked.  
* * *  
The hallways of Hogarth, Chao, and Benowitz were dark and empty. It was nearing nine o’clock in the evening, and most of the partners and legal aids had called it a day. Foggy Nelson sat alone in his private office mulling over a few details of a case he would be continuing tomorrow defending a hedge fund big-wig who was charged with manslaughter after prostitutes were found dead from a drug overdose at a company party. He packed his folders, reviewed the evidence to be covered the next day, and sipped repeatedly at his eighth cup of coffee of the day. On the edge of the desk was his copy of the New York Bulletin that ran Karen's article on his case. He'd circled it in red marker and had a scissor next to it ready to cut out and have Marci paste into a scrapbook he commissioned of the articles he and Karen worked together on, which no one could prove, he insisted. He yawned widely, gripping the porcelain handle of his coffee mug tight, and lifted it for another warm sip.

Marci appeared at his doorway, leaning on the frame and holding a bottle Jack Daniels in her hand.  
"I'm heading out," she called to him lifting the bottle high in the air.  
"Care to join me for a night cap?"  
"Can't," he said disheartened. "Got this case continuing tomorrow early, still gotta pull together a couple of things."  
Marci scoffed, "Oh like that's ever stopped you before?"  
"Now that's very true," Foggy affirmed leaning back in his chair, gripping his hands on the black leather arms. "But...", he winced, "Right now I am REALLY scrambling with one, these guys are all over the place." Marci pouted, overextending her bottom limp in a whimper.  
"C'mon, Foggy Bear, have a little fun!", she cried.  
Foggy pouted back sympathetically, pointing a single finger at her.  
"I will get you next time, I promise," he insisted. Marci's pout lessened slightly.  
"Okay," she responded. She caught notice of the Bulletin issue sitting on Foggy's desk and nodded over to it.  
"She did a good job, huh?"  
"Yeah," Foggy confirmed. "Yeah, of course she did."  
Marci waved her hands slightly before she began to saunter away.  
"I'll see you tomorrow then. Sweet dreams of me," she bid him. Foggy smirked to himself, turning back around in his desk and pouring himself into his paperwork again.

A few moments passed before another set of footsteps rang out tentatively down the hallway. Foggy kept to his work, assuming it was another partner leaving after a long day at work. That was, until he heard a small rapping from his doorway.  
"Excuse me, bud," a man's voice said. "I was, uh, just down the hall meeting with my attorney. You guys got a can anywhere on this floor?"  
"Just down the hall, hook a right and it's the second door down."  
Foggy looked up to see a very tall man with a completely shaved head standing the doorway. He was dressed completely in black, wearing a heavy leather jacket. Suspicious, Foggy though, as it was already late April and a little too warm for a heavy jacket, but hey, I guess he just looks like a criminal. Foggy looked back on his paperwork, but the man didn't leave from the doorway.  
"Hey, I know you...", he said observantly. "You're one of those Nelson & Murdock lawyers, right? The guys who did that Punisher trial!"  
Foggy was already exhausted of being connected to Frank's trail, but he confirmed.  
"Yep, that was me. On to bigger and better things now." Foggy turned back to his work, but from his peripheral, he could see the man slowly entering the room.  
"Must've been one hell of a case, what with that nut and all. You guys never had a chance, if you don't mind me sayin'. Had a chance to meet him once, definitely not as tough as he looks," he said with a snicker. The man took notice of a framed photo that Foggy kept relatively hidden on his desk of the Nelson & Murdock trial team, a bittersweet photo of Foggy, Karen, and Matt laughing by the pool table at Josie's. The man pointed to it.  
"Yeah, see, there you guys are!", he exclaimed. "You, that blind guy, and that little blonde bombshell." He let out another snicker. "Either of you bangin' her?"  
Foggy raised his head aggravated and disgusted at this sentiment, and it was then that he noticed the man had walked his way almost right up to his desk, standing only about three to four feet away.  
"Uh...", he stuttered. "Uh... no, no we're not. Can I, uh, can I help you with something, man?"  
The man laughed more. From close up, Foggy noticed the jagged edges of his face, leaving shadows cast all along lower pants. His face was sunken in, almost skeletal. He stood now right at the foot of Foggy's desk, holding the framed picture up in his hands, running his fingers along the image of Karen.  
"Well, if you could tell me where to get a sexy little secretary like this, you'd make me a happy man." 

Foggy's whole body was tensing, sweat forming on his brow. He laughed back nervously, all as he pulled his cell phone out of his pant's pocket and had 911 dialed ready to call. The man lifted his attention from the picture to Foggy, his cold, beady eyes piercing right into him.  
"Now, what would you wanna go do that for?", the man asked. The man lifted half his mouth in a twisted half grin, looking down now on Foggy's phone. Foggy raised his hands in the air.  
"Look, man, I don't want any trouble here," Foggy started. "I'm just trying to finish up some work and..."  
The man leaned onto the desk shoving the picture towards Foggy's face.  
"You tell me where she is and you can finish anything you want," he rasped.  
Foggy knew he didn't have much time to think about his next move. He looked around briefly weighing his fighting options. He had nothing that resembling a weapon in his office, so he did the only other thing he could think of. Foggy quickly pressed the call button on his phone and leapt from his desk in an attempt to escape. It was fruitless, however. The man dropped the picture on the desk, reached his hands instantly over to Foggy's head and slammed it down forcibly onto the desk. Foggy was dazed, trying desperately to scramble towards the door, but the man grabbed him by the arm, twisted it unnaturally on the desk as Foggy wailed in pain. The man then took a pistol out from his waistband and held it up to the back of Foggy's head.  
"Now, boy, you're gonna tell me where I can find this pretty little friend of yours or else you're all gonna end up with bullets in your head, you hear me? She ain't at home, that's for sure! You hidin' her somewhere, boy? You know where she's at? You know no matter where she is, I'm gonna find her! And I sure as hell ain't gonna miss."  
With that, a security guard came bounding down the hall with his weapon drawn.  
"Mr. Nelson!", yelled the guard. He raised his weapon to the man, but with a forceful grunt, the man lifted the gun and shot the guard right through the skull. Foggy's vision was obstructed as his head was pushed down, but he could swear that the bullet had entered the guard on a curve.

The man concentrated the gun again on Foggy, but in the distance the two could hear police sirens pulling up the block. Instead, the man returned the gun to his waistband and pulled out a small hunting knife. He leaned into Foggy, his mouth right up to Foggy's ear.  
"You tell your little friend I came lookin' for her, understand? You tell her who came lookin' for her." Suddenly, Foggy felt a horrifying sharp pain on the back of his neck and he shrieked and writhed on his desk in pain as he felt the man carve something into him with the knife. He finished, tucking the knife away in his pants again.  
"And one more thing," the man said sneering. "For good measure." The arm he used to hold Foggy's behind his back yanked upward, dislocating Foggy's shoulder so terribly that his arm stayed frozen stuck behind his back. Foggy howled again, falling to the ground as the man let him go and ran out the door. He could hear the police sirens outside now as he began to lose consciousness from the pain.  
* * *  
Karen and Frank stood together in the kitchen, both smiling, though both nervous and confused about how they would approach this new plan.  
"So," Karen started. "I'll go to work as usual tomorrow. I'll call Matt, he can follow me there and hang around outside, what have you. We should probably keep you out of sight for most of this..."  
She trailed off. Her attention was drawn to the police radio Frank had on the floor. A voice on the other end was yelling.  
"10-24!", the voice shouted. "10-24S, shots fired, 45th between 8th and 9th, suspect fled, one male victim DOA, one male victim found unconscious at the scene! We're gonna need a bus..."  
The rest trailed off. Karen's thoughts raced. 45th between 8th and 9th, 45th between 8th and 9th. Suddenly Karen gasped loudly.  
"FOGGY!", she cried. Karen ran towards the door grabbing her jacket and threw it on as she darted out the door and down the stairs. Frank followed, shouting after her.  
"Karen, wait!", he yelled. Karen did not wait. She reached the foot of the staircase and bounded out the door and up the dark streets towards the offices of Hogarth, Chao, and Benowitz.


End file.
